Jamal Khashoggi

As they cut off Mr. Khashoggi’s head and dismembered his body, a doctor of forensics who had been brought along for the dissection and disposal had some advice for the others, according to the senior Turkish official.

Listen to music, he told them, as he put on headphones himself. That was what he did to ease the tension when doing such work, the official said, describing the contents of the audio recording.

Where Jared goes, embarrassment follows. He’s Midas minus the touch and the humility. Oblivious to the truth of the kingdom that he was romancing, he bought into and promoted the idea of the Saudis as forward-thinking fixers who would make his self-aggrandizing delusion of peace in the Middle East happen. Now he watches and winces as they clumsily try to settle on the right lie about what happened to the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who is believed to have been tortured, murdered and dismembered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

Last year Jared persuaded President Trump to choose Saudi Arabia as his first big stop on his first big foreign trip. He was on the phone with the kingdom so often that it frightened some American security experts. America’s spies, meanwhile, caught wind of communiqués between foreign officials talking about how easily manipulated Jared might be.

What does he have to say about the Saudis and Khashoggi? Nothing. He has his usual moral laryngitis. He’s integral when there’s the hope of credit, invisible when there’s the certainty of blame.